Paper houses: the new housing question

Giovanni Caudo

Houses become 'paper houses': they were issued as securities on the financial market to produce profitability and to support the banking system and company restructuring. The costs of this restructuring process weigh not only on families renting their houses, but also on those who are buying, since they burden themselves with high mortgage repayments. Property companies are making unprecedented profits and increasing their turnover from year to year. The housing question therefore has features that are quite different from those experienced in the past, and the solutions also need to be different.